Light and Half-Closed Eyes
by ancientandmostnoble
Summary: Shell Cottage, amid the war, 1998. A time of grief and loss, and Luna Lovegood plays in the streams with Freshwater Plimpies. Meanwhile, Dean Thomas' wounds are slowly healing.


**Light and half-closed eyes**

You let out a cry. A Freshwater Plimpie writhes between your fingers, and you smile at my direction, happy. I watch you acknowledging my nod, the nod I always give you whenever you expect me to understand when I don't. I don't find you uneasy to be with anymore.

You always made me feel uneasy, Luna. Back during the years at Hogwarts, and Lord, that does seem such a distant light in my memories, I lived with my heartstrings pulsing and beating with the rest of them all, so how could have I seen you? Seen right through you? The only thing you made me feel was the heavy uneasiness that kept lowering my eyelids, more, and more...

I see right through you now. The jeans I leant you are way too big on your bough-slim waist, but Harry's belt is doing a decent job on you; they're rolled up to your knees, but still you managed to wet them. You take the Plimpie up to your nostrils and sniff the pungent odour of its scales; you told me once that Freshwater Plimpies emanate a curing smell. I asked you what the smell cured you from. You answered, From spasms of emptiness.

I still don't know why, but those words seemed to have squeezed my heart a little, because I felt sad. I felt the same way when I accidentally dug out mum's one or two ancient photographs, those old ones with dad smiling from them and the date of the year printed at the very bottom right.

I see you give the gentlest smile to the fish, and then carefully dip it back in the waters of the stream. It immediately shoots forwards, probably disbelieving such luck. You used to fish them and take them to your father, but you suddenly stopped. It was one of the first things I started to understand about you. The age of innocence is gone, and with this war raging on, you think that anyone and anything deserves a second chance. Even a Freshwater Plimpie.

Luna, I don't understand you. There, I said it. I told you this once upon a time, and I promised I would never say it again. You were describing to me the appearance of a Nargle, while we were waiting for Harry to turn up to the Room of Requirements, and Seamus had gone up to Ron to discuss the Impedimenta Jinx. The fire was blazing behind you, and your eyes seemed to be bluer and odder than usual. I think you scared me. You kept repeating a question full of jargons of your type, and I just didn't get you.

"I don't understand," I said helplessly, and you shut your mouth, widened your eyes and looked at me, shocked. I didn't understand it then, but now I know why you were so affected: nobody ever told what they were always, perennially feeling about you straight at your face. They lived with half-closed eyes.

The next time we talked was two years later, three days after we arrived at Bill Weasley and his wife's house. I had just gone down for breakfast, still sleepy, when your bony frame just blocked the staircase, blocked me. You seemed to radiate too much light, and I suspected it was your hair then, but now I have to reconsider. I actually think I squinted, but I can't be too sure.

"Dean, I would very much like you to help me pick up Gerobilian Conkers for Bill and Fleur." It wasn't even a question. It was a request; but such a gentle, soft request that I nodded, as I always nod, and followed you into the light.

You step back outside the current of the stream. The sun pours down through the fragrant, green leaves of the ash tree to whom you've so devotedly expressed your love with bonfires of leaves and the remnants of Chocolate Frogs. You solemnly explained that the smoke contained the scent of green and burnt chocolate, and that the ash three could absorb it to nourish himself. I said, the tree wouldn't like to eat his own children. And you said, the tree's dead children are going back to him, inside the core of their father, to stay there forever. I nodded at hearing you say this.

The sun is bright, but as you approach, you look brighter. And this is not silly romanticism I'm trying to express, it's just what you seem to exude, from objective eyes. I'm trying to remain objective. Back at school, my eyes were half-closed. Maybe it's because your light is too strong, so that all other ordinary people have to close their lids to protect themselves. Yes, I think that's it.

You sit down next to me, and I can hear you humming something so sweet, and your hands seem to ooze so much life, they glisten and they're so pearly. Is it your proximity that makes me formulate such meddled thoughts? I like the way we, no wait, I stopped trying to converse in order to push away the uneasiness. You talk about Crumple-Horned Snorcacks and I nod, and you're so satisfied by that simple gesture. Your ankle is still wet, and it accidentally brush against mine, and I think I understand you. I understand all about you, Luna. You opened my eyes.

You're the one who never does or says anything that people expect. You're the one who always speaks nothing, nothing but the truth. You're the one who cries in earnest at the sight of an orange sunset from the window of Shell Cottage's kitchen. You're the bright light, and all of us live with half-closed eyes, too afraid to face the happiness of sniffing a Freshwater Plimpie.


End file.
